


Settling Accounts the Long Way Round

by HarlequinR



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Braavos, Essos, Iron Bank, Scribe, Self-Insert, acountancy for fun and profit, invention of stationary, keeping it as realistic as I can
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-09-22
Packaged: 2019-10-02 02:41:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 14,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17256104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HarlequinR/pseuds/HarlequinR
Summary: An Essosi SI.





	1. Chapter 1

Waking up somewhere strange without any memory of how you got there is never a good sign. Waking up because you've just tried to inhale brackish water instead of air even less so, and doing it in a city that doesn't actually exist worse still. It's a strange situation to be in, and by a far greater margin an unpleasant one, where you know you're not dreaming, and yet expect (that is to say, hope) that at any moment now the real world will return. But it doesn't. So was spent my first moments in Braavos.  
  
I did benefit, I'll fully admit, from the city being the type of cosmopolitan local that lets a lot pass without heads turning in an unfriendly manner. Any oddly dressed individual pulling themselves out of the shallow water they had just woken up face down in was obviously a visitor that had been a bit too deep in their cups the night before. Especially when they stand there looking at the Titan like they've never seen it before, then have a small moment to themselves. The thing is, there is only so long you can sustain panic, fear, grief, outrage or any other strong emotion. After a while, almost despite yourself, the mind says 'let’s put this aside, we'll revisit it later'. Also to my fortune, or more likely theirs, quite a few of the stallholders in the small markets dotting the city were happy to buy as well as sell, one of them generously letting me convert a sterling silver chain bracelet into at least two thirds of what it was actually worth in square iron coin. As I later gathered, near the docks there was good business to be had from sailors that had missed the boat, sometimes literally, or who's coin had since added to the golder river, and needed quick cash.  
  
My funds began to quickly disappear into, first, a street barber who knew when a bucket of hot water was called for, two in fact, and then new clothing, more on which later. Breakfast actually got me change, which I thought might not exist as a concept here, and a bench to sit and think at while I ate my wrap of somewhat suspicious content. Thoughts of the future for the most part, since I was still ruthlessly avoiding those of the past, since that way lay nothing good at this stage. I'd brought a valuable set of specialised skills and knowledge with me when I was dropped into GRRM's bloodsoaked sandbox, and if I wanted anything like an acceptable quality of life I was going to need squeeze every benefit I could out of them. Now looking presentable, I spent most of the rest of the morning getting lost in an attempt to aquire the tools of my trade, which did yeild fruit eventually even if it did cost me most of what I still had. But, there's no point in buying second rate when its your livelihood on the line.  
  
Now, Braavos is, for a given value of butterfly, a 'renaissance' city just like the rest of the Free Cities. Such a wonderfully vague term, but it does the job of separating them conceptually from 'medieval' Westeros. And the point of bringing this up is that things are a touch more organised, professional in fact, than across the Narrow Sea. I couldn't simply turn up and sell my skills with a good sales pitch and an on the spot demonstration. Here I'd need to meet guild, brotherhood, friendly and benevolent society, or equivalent body's recognised standards and receive appropriate accreditation to be taken seriously by anyone that might hire me, and to ensure I'm working from the same rulebook as my peers when it comes to pricing, quality of work and mandatory donations to the retirement and injuries fund.  
  
Small aside; My knowledge of the 'setting', or 'the world' as I should rightly call it, was somewhat broader than it was deep, which was a potentially problematic issue, to say the least. So with the blithe confidence of someone still dealing with the surreal nature of the situation I was taking full and gross advantage of Braavos' status in international trade to play the emigre, complete with reason for leaving home that he'd rather not get into. People's imaginations filled in the details far better than an overworked explanation on my part ever could, and of course people will hear slightly different versions so I didn't need to worry about consistency too much either. At this stage I have to give thanks to two people that unintentionally helped me in this endevour. My maternal grandmother, whose stories of first coming to the UK would be as much a boon as her decades long struggle to make me bilingual, and I say that last part genuinely. And my university flatmate, whose need for an accurately dressed, and cheap, model taught me how to fold a chiton and himation.  
  
The results of my ransacking of historical fashion trends were good enough for Essos, which was lucky since I had beggared myself for raw materials and was sleeping with one eye open in what could only generously be described as a bunkhouse. While I can't say the Masters were entirely beside themselves with joy to have a random and oddly dressed individual turn up to their door looking for recognition, I had come in with ten sheets of parchment displaying various styles of calligraphy in a range of applications, and an example each of my finest double entry bookkeeping high density, but legible, script. A few hours of increasingly knit-picky verbal, practical and written examination later, and I was officially welcomed as a brother of the quill. I slept that night on a poor-brother's pallet of finest hemp sacking, ate a full two meals the next day in return for converting a pile of scrawled mess into legible copy, and was then presented to a young merchant whose ancient secretary was too much of a family heirloom to dismiss, and too blind to carry out the practical side of their job.  
  
By the time we'd reached his house and I'd put my case down in the box room, I could also tell he was not going to let an inability to make out what I was writing stand in the way of knowing that I wasn't doing it well enough. Given the range of options as to where I could have ended up, I thought I'd had a rather good deal.


	2. Chapter 2

Magister Nakarro Mararis, my new employer, may have been at the grass roots level of his social class, but that humble station did not stop him being happy to coast along on minimum effort. It had been his grandfather that was responsible for the family's rise to high society through a gambler's keen eye for high risk/high reward ventures, and marrying the progeny a more established and respectable family, as new money is want to do. When, after one risky voyage too many claimed the old patriarch, the next generation took over, risk fell out of fashion and the family's wealth was invested in more reliably steady endeavours; warehousing, Iron Bank shares, minority investments in scores of nice, safe trade routes. Not fancy, but profitable enough once the ball got rolling. This approach also gave Nakarro's father the opportunity to build up an honestly impressive list of contacts and business acquaintances from Ibb to Qarth as he spread his money far and wide. He apparently passed from 'bad wine' a few years before my arrival, either a euphemism I have yet to untangle or an oddly straightforward statement.  
  
And that leads us up to the time I entered the scene. Now, I can't entirely blame Nakarro for his attitude, I'm given to understand his father rather beat the adventurousness out of him early on, but he could have taken a more active hand than relying on the inertia of his father's old investments and contacts. Even I knew those were resources you needed to maintain if you wanted them to keep providing, and another reason in addition to sentimentality for his keeping Old Daranio around, who came into service two generations back, when by rights he should have retired. His wife, Arina, did help maintain the family's presence in the proper social circles though, and was very much of the most respectable crowd herself, for good and ill. Their house, likewise, was in an old and genteel neighborhood, with a small and discreet body of staff, Braavos being a city where keeping a large numbers of household servants was considered somewhat gauche. The lady of the house found my clothing and I 'delightfully exotic', a comment I took with the grace any new start in a position of precarious employment would, and the young twins were curious in the manner of children everywhere when they could escape their nanny. Daranio accepted that there was, possibly, a need for me in the house, which was likely as warm a reception as he was capable off, though I caught 'errand boy' in the undercurrents of his meaning.  
  
My box room was no worse than many examples of student accommodation I'd seen in the past; bare floorboards, whitewashed plaster walls, and furnishings that would suit a monk's cell. The view from the window was mostly what I might call 'renaissance brutalist', since exterior decoration didn't extend much past the first floor in most cases and the higher up you lived the worse off you generally were. On the other hand, it came with a paycheck, or technically a promissory note, which meant I was both solvent and could rely on the Iron Bank's vaults instead of a box under the bed. I'll admit to having underestimated the financial sophistication of the Free Cities, and in a seemingly anachronist turn of events, people with money to their name are more likely to suffer fraud than mugging on a day to day basis. Most of my duties at this early stage revolved around filing and organising paperwork, transcribing a backlog of Daranio's scrawl into legible text, and writing the various letters and notes that didn't warrant the Magister's personal attention, as dictated by me elder counterpart. Writing neatly at speed with a feather quill is not for the faint hearted it has to be said, and in the event I save up enough money, I have every intention to commission a set of proper quill pen nibs from a skilled metalworker. If intellectual property is a thing in Essos, they'll make me a fortune or at least raise me to sainthood among my fellow scribes.  
  
I swiftly moved to the more sombre colour scheme of respectable locals, but kept the style since it was proving quite comfortable in the Braavosi summer, after being informed about bravos. There are maybe better ways of channeling the energy and aggression of young men with money to burn, but there are also many worse ways too. It's rather treated as a form of street theater by the locals, many bravos waiting for a crowd before getting down to business, and public safety is maintained by how hideously embarrassing it would be getting caught challenging an unskilled opponent. They should also not, absolutely not, be confused with professional water-dancers, who as bodyguards and escorts would not deign to dual a rich dalliant despite, or because of, the contempt in which they're held.  
  
On the subject of the city, the Titan makes it quite easy to navigate once you get used to the peculiarities of local urban planning, and while I'd argue in favour of a guardrail, the pavements are quite wide and kept at least as tidy as any back home. You do eventually get used to the Titan's roar during the night I should say, despite every expectation to the contrary. The food is rather good so long as you accept that only the rich eat red meat or fresh fruit and vegetables. The lack of widespread malnutrition among the general public that you might expect from such an arrangement being attributable to a well managed seaweed harvest and the extensive efforts of the pickling industry in more agriculturally inclined regions. Since fuel needs to be brought in, most people can't afford to cook at home regularly, making the street vendor culinary king of the masses. Almost everything comes wrapped in a not-quite-tortilla, which can be interesting at times, though I can see a bright future for chopsticks if cheap, throwaway bowls are ever invented.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previous chapters now edited and expanded.

My gods (and at this moment I was less than fussy about which one(s) answered) but I haven't seen filing this bad since student dorm days. It looks organised I'll grant, the office neat, piles straight, and shelves uncluttered, drawing you into a snare of false hope. Then you look closer and the truth is out. Daranio can't read anything smaller than a street sign clearly, so everything is arranged by how recently it arrived. And that's it, he just remembers how far back something arrived and then circles in on it. Which was fine, for a given value of not even close, when it was just him, but now that I'm here there will need to be changes. At least he no longer writes anything himself, which is a relief. There are conversations you never want to have, and explaining to a professional scribe that they might want to put down the quill permanently is one of them, easily up there with taking the car keys off an elderly relative. I think he'd built up a strong wall of denial on a foundation that his mind was still sharp as a tack, and my presence was seen as something of an attack on that point of pride. We have settled past that stage now that I've shown due difference and he's recognised I have a valid contribution to offer, but it's still going to be rather a while before we're more than work associates. Magister Mararis was not, I think, fully aware of the situation, and I decided that he didn't need to know everything. 'Lies to children' applies as much here as it did at home; we needed a small outlay to keep the correspondence tidy now that there were two of us working on it.  
  
The ring binder may not have been invented yet, nor the post-it note or filing cabinet, but the filing box has and I can build from there until my future stationary empire gets off the ground. Slowly and carefully, since I was obliged to do it in my own time or in lulls in my normal work, order was had. Maybe there is something about the kind of person willing to take up calligraphy in the age of text and digital art, but looking at the stiffened canvas boxes lining the wall, all labeled and indexed, I felt something inside. It was admittedly thankless work, but it set things up well for the future and avoided any embarrassing situations where I had to turn over half the room to find a single sheet of paper. On the other hand I was also going to have to commit to additional record keeping and ledger work that Daranio had avoided by dedicating things to memory, a glaring flaw in my ability he is trying to rectify out of professional pride.  
  
A similar, but much shorter and more private learning curve came with reacquainting myself with the abacus. An underrated tool, not nearly as useful as a spreadsheet of course, but still a whole league above writing all the transactions out longhand and adding or subtracting in columns. And it would have been done on slate. I'm not wasting paper, parchment or any other writing material on anything that doesn't need to be set down permanently, not at the prices charged for them here. Braavos having minimal native supplies of the raw materials for any of the above, it is all imported. The Mararis family being committed to reliable returns, it is one of their major avenues of investment. This confluence of events and conditions created a odd scene when the next ship carrying some arrived.  
  
Myself and three other functionaries representing the various interested parties watched the cargo being unloaded, checked by customs, and loaded onto canal boats for local delivery. Huddled on the dock, we then watched each other watch each other go through the numbers and agree that all was correct. Later that day, significant sums of money shifted between columns in the Iron Bank's ledgers, and we all collected an A5 receipt.  
  
Not all time can be spent on work, however necessary it might be in the eyes of our employers, and the city does have a range of options in regard to entertainment for the masses or the connoisseur. The biggest of these is theater, and much like movies in the 50's people will come and watch just about anything. Reviews are generally direct though: they laughed, they cried, they caught that actor strait in the face at 20 paces for making us do neither for half the act. As with everything it comes down to how much you're willing to spend, and at my level that falls at standing rather than sitting, but tiled floor rather than sawdust. In abeyance of universal laws there is always someone working a concession tray with things salted, sweet or thirst quenching. Concentrated around the docks are drinking establishments of varying quality and ladies of negotiable affection likewise. With my fingernails now permanently ink-stained I was eligible to set foot in the Crossed Quills, favoured watering hole of the literate and underappreciated. You should see the graffiti drunk scribes manage.  
  
It was also the place to pick up a great deal of second hand information on what was going on in the wider world, insofar as it disrupted the regular paperwork. The onset of winter for example, which was apparently due for official announcement any day now and the signal for rabid speculation on Westerosi grain and wool prices. Not that we were getting away from it in Essos, but it was amazing what you could do with the type of proper logistics they didn't use over the Narrow Sea. Times like these you counted your lucky stars and invested in thick socks. And when the going got really tough I still had the mantra of ways it could have been worse to fall back on; in half the world I would have been enslaved, in the Seven Kingdoms they still use fingers for counting, I could have been born a Stark...


	4. Chapter 4

It only took a month after the snow started for the canals to freeze over solid. Luckily this isn't an unexpected situation and where once we had gondolas and narrowboats we now have sleighs, in many cases by the simple expedient of bolting on tracks to bottom of hulls. Far more serious is the ice that builds up on the docks, which teams of burly men chip off day and night in anything less than blizzard conditions. They're the most well paid labourers in the city and get their wages each month in advance, an important perk given that one in five of them won't see the next summer.  
  
From these points the sharp witted will notice that the coming of a minor ice age is not going to stop the good people of Braavos from exercising their mercantile rights. The street markets move into rented warehouses, and the food stalls into bars, but without the truly awful winters they get across the sea, things adapt rather than stop. In fact I'd hazard a guess that more money is changing hands now than in summer, if through more specialised paths. Each month a wagon train the size of a small village arrives from Qohor via Novos, weighed down with charcoal and firewood by the ton. For the return journey they load up with salt cod and herring. We stay warm, they stay fed, everyone comes out the other side of winter on the right side of the grave. And that is why the docks are a feature maintained with such critical care; we've got the second largest fishing fleet north of the Summer Sea, and the best manned if I'm not being too biased. If it swims, there's at least one captain who knows where to find it. With the top half of Westeros being somewhat light on seamanship, Gulltown and Whiteharbour are always happy to welcome a purple sailed ship with open arms and treasuries.  
  
On a more personal level, winter can take a running jump. Don't get me wrong, for a while the snow is nice, the cold crisp and refreshing, the lack of mosquitoes appreciated. Then the reality of all sets in: I'm living with this weather for upward of a year, hot running water is but a dream, a chest cough hovers over my health like a specter. If I go outside, it's swathed in clothes that wouldn't look out of place on an arctic expedition, felt boots and mitts, thick woolens and a windproof cloak. Inside I'm still wrapped in layers. Fuel is extortionate enough that even the magisters economise when they aren't entertaining guests, so you can imagine where the help lies in that equation. Myself and other staff bunk down in two rooms each night instead of the individual or twin ones we normally have, and commit to not murdering anyone that snores. The children started crawling up the walls some time ago to no one's surprise, but that's Teana's problem and she can keep it. For my own part I'm getting out often enough to avoid cabin fever, but on the other hand I do have to actually go outside.  
  
The larger and more upmarket drinking establishments, seeing the opportunity present in people not wanting to do much traveling and in need of private rooms, are the place where a good amount of business is transacted during the snowy years. By prior arrangement, the magisters occupy one or another for a couple of days each week to wheel and deal, secretaries in tow. To be honest, a reasonable amount of my (and my peer's) time there is spent waiting for the higher ups to get past the social stage to where hard numbers are being discussed and contracts determined, but they have a game like dominoes but with cards that's quite popular for passing the down time. Formal contracts are actually one of the few chances I get to go full throttle on the calligraphy front. You want a lot of complex, but consistent, fine detail, duplicated on both copies so that they can be matched together in the event of a dispute. Every scribe develops a set of details unique to them, only visible on close inspection, and with two of us working on each copy it gets that much harder to make a forgery. In my case these include a subtle notch mark on the first letter of each sentence, a scattering of dots in the border grouped in the sequence of the first five numbers of pi, and a different twist in the dot of an 'I' compared to a full stop. It should be noted the guild comes down on forgers to an even harder degree than the law does, and those so caught can be identified thereafter by their broken fingers.  
  
When brought together in quantity, we scribes and secretaries also grumble and gossip of course. Mostly about the lack of appreciation and cost of paper, but we can actually be almost embarrassingly undiscerning on that front. The drama that is working with factors from the Seven Kingdoms comes up quite often, given how much money there is to made off nobles that have looked to more developed parts of the world and thought, 'I want a bit of that lifestyle'. Despite all the exposure they've had, the Royal Court is the only place where you can find anything like a proper secretarial body. For near every other seat of power they reckon that one man and his raven is all you need by way of properly educated staff, and a running joke says that the Citadel classes accountancy as a type of magic. By luck, despite the above, I'm in the employ of someone without a stake in the King's Landing trade route, goldmine though it is in any season (too much piracy in the Narrow Sea apparently). There's not many places I'm blacklisting for travel to on broad principle, but for the sake of my health that city is one of them, and not just for the risk of cholera. If It wasn't for the ill attention it would undoubtedly draw, I'd make some specific bets on the future of various personages in the Seven Kingdoms and be set for life.  
  
A better kind of attention is however arriving from the direction of one Nesera Nestyl, lady's maid to the good Magister Mararis' wife and master of the subtle inflection. All things considered I'm reluctant to take things too far this side of winter's end, and how far she's looking to go is another question. The eight months we've been cooped up in close confines can skew perceptions after all.


	5. Chapter 5

I manage to get through winter without frostbite, noteworthy illness, or undue weight loss. Unfortunately, not everyone did. There was a period when it looked like spring was starting to break through, but in the end all we got was a few months of cold fog blanketing the city and surrounding coastline. An outbreak of coughs and chest colds swept through the more vulnerable part of the population, victims of the damp chill that permeated the city. Old Daranio started coughing just before winter started its final leg, and was confined to his bed within a fortnight. The best medicine and care the family could arrange kept him stable for a month before it developed into full blown pneumonia. He spent the next two months fighting a losing battle against it before the end came.  
  
I can't say I was close to him, but I did respect him. The dedication he showed, the ability that he undoubtedly had, even after his eyes failed him and he was forced to work from memory, were both highly admirable. I learned a lot from him, directly or otherwise, and can certainly say I wouldn't have been as good at my job as I was if I hadn't met him. To be honest, despite the fact that I was specifically hired on to take over his duties, no one had actually considered the idea of him dying. Two generations of the family had grown up with him as much a feature of the hose at the stonework and furniture; who would think he might ever be gone from it? The guild covered his funeral expenses (ensured, that is, that he was not tipped off the end of a pier as many of the poorest were in winter), as they would eventually do for me and every other member. Mourning-song at the Moonsinger's temple, a weighted shroud, space on a funeral barge to take him out some distance before consigning him to the sea. He had no family that anyone knew about, so I inherited his effects and the guild his savings.  
  
The trouble of course, is that life doesn't wait on things like this before it happens, and business even less so. There are a few new jobs on my desk now, though the issue that concerns is that a lot of secondary information on those we dealt with was never written down anywhere (how thought it would need to be?), and I had only learned what came up in passing. The contract details are all known and set out in ink, but there are side notes and contextual data that I'm going to need to do without, or relearn from scratch. Daranio's death is throwing the magister out of kilter more than it is me, understandably given how long he'd been at the heart of the man's financial affairs and day to day life. I'm concerned he's grown overused to how much his secretary had been involved in the running of things, more, I knew, than was common elsewhere. There is a bit of luck, in that quite a few of the current contracts are long term, or copy-and-paste deals repeated between the same group of merchants, but when the spring arrives properly, and the overland routes open up, there is going to be a lot of new negotiations. Unfortunately, I know what else is coming with spring, and it is going to sour him to Westerosi deals just when others will be looking to make a killing off it. The Mararis fortune is not so large that the family could afford to both lose out in a foreign market its rivals prosper in, and fail to adapt to changes at home. Yet at this stage I have a vested interest in their success.  
  
Not to sound too mercenary or ungrateful, but it's a vested interest I'm willing to lose. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing but best wishes for their success and every intention of doing my job to the best of my ability for as long as I'm in their employ. But I'm also acutely aware of how much more security there is in having self sufficiency and self direction in this world, and I'm confident that this is something I can achieve without sacrificing my own morals or other people, for all that I'm living in melodrama. I just hope with my whole heart I'm not put into a position where I'm forced to make that kind of choice. If I'm careful however, I can start to make small steps in the right direction without too many waves.  
I sold Daranio's clothes (I draw the line at literally stepping into a dead man's shoes), this time for a fairer than previously, and withdrew some of my savings after finding a coppersmith suitable for my plans. Take a four inch length of wire and add three bends with a nail, you now have a paperclip, repeat another two dozen times and you have a minor act of clerical uplift. I took them to the guild first, out of professional courtesy and because no one else understands the importance of keeping paper in order as much as a scribe (well, actually there is, but more on them anon), and presented them to the guildmasters. You could hear the wheels in their minds shift gear when they eventually started to cotton on to the usefulness of them: If the battle between chaos and filing were a fistfight, I'd just handed the good guys brass knuckles. Remember there are no ring binders, staplers, or clear plastic pockets. There are either filing boxes and folios, neither of which are suitable for separating a few sheets of related material among a larger bandle, or ribbon and twine, which is inconvenient for speed or can damage the sheets. The paperclip is one of those inventions that seems so simple that you wonder how no one thought of it earlier, yet at the same time such a novel solution that it's amazing anyone thought it up at all. Now just to wait and see what the response was on the grapevine.  
  
I appreciate that I'm taking something of a gamble with my money when by rights I should be saving for the possibility the magister's finances go under, there's no guarantee my 'invention' will take off at all. Even if it does, the paperclip will never produce a fortune, and it's an idea so easily copied once out there that I have no doubt it will be within weeks. But loss of face from breaking a contract is a serious matter here, something that can stay with you through future negotiations, so a head start to be the first out there and get those contracts (if they exist) is important. The guild will be discounted heavily at any rate, good will is worth more than gold and they are the body that will have my back in the event of trouble or strife.


	6. Chapter 6

It was a terrible surprise to the magisters of Braavos when the Seven Kingdoms determined that the solution to their political problems was to break out into full scale civil war before the first harvest since winter's end was in. Who could have predicted such a thing? Nobody betting on the smart money this side of the Narrow Sea anyway, not with the trade routes just starting to get back to normal. But that's the problem with being from a more civilised part of the world (relatively speaking, but it's home now), you expect rational thinking from the rest of it. As you might expect, this is in no way helping the city recover from the winter lull, and a few people are already out of pocket because of it.  
  
Mostly from the fact that the Valemen managed to half sack their own largest city and principle harbour. There are still a few questions hanging regarding payments for lost stock, and while the Lord Arryn has been smart enough to not alienate people that might easily become critical lifelines going forward, delayed payment is still delayed payment. This is in fact indicative of the overarching financial issues that have sprung up in the wake of the various Lords and knights raising their forces. All those men marching, fighting, or otherwise engaging in military matters are not working the fields, digging the mines or otherwise bringing in an income for their liege. At the same time, those nobles needed to feed, equipe and pay the troops they'd raised with coffers that are less than briming. I wouldn't be surprised if there are a few Westerosi nobles making visits to the Iron Bank in the near future, and it makes my eyes water to imagine the interest rates they'll ask of a borrower involved in a civil war.  
  
Grain merchants are going to make a fortune at least, since there is no way in the Seven Hells the North or Vale is going to be feeding itself this year, and there are a good few armourers and bladesmiths that will be likely doing well for themselves to. Too early to tell if the Disputed Lands will see more or less warfare in response. Everyone with a stake in the rich agricultural region will be eager to maximise their sphere of influence and minimise other's, though the rumour mill is currently leaning towards a ceasefire. Lys, Myr and Tyrosh are currently quite evenly matched in how much control they can exert in the region, and enlightened self interest is expected to see them all look to make as much money as they can, and not start a fight with one of the others incase it enriches the remaining sister or draws them in as an additional foe.  
  
In regards the sudden desire for credit on the part of the Lords of the Seven Kingdoms, I'm glad to say Magister Mararis's wide (if frayed) network of contacts has proved quite beneficial. While a somewhat underused and under-maintained resource, it has managed to help him avoid getting into too many deals with those that already have extended lines of credit. Some entanglement was unavoidable to keep the good contracts in place, but that's a risk in any circumstances, so no big concern. Lady Mararis is taking the opportunity to play up his obvious business savvy, though the fact he hasn't jumped onto the lucrative war profiteering ship somewhat discredits the notion (and is carefully ignored).  
  
Going further I can attest that he is in fact having something of a dither in regards to what to do next, not really having the mindset for dealing with this kind of circumstance. While my three-ish years of experience here might not be sufficient for me to do better than he is, I don't think I would be doing that much worse. I can't obviously say anything to him in this regard (certainly not my place), though I am taking every opportunity to remind him of queries that need replied to, pass on the latest news from abroad, and arrange his correspondence to make sure that certain information is the first thing he reads in the morning. At least the Essosi trade patterns are keeping relatively stable, and the family can always rely on its investment plans and long standing shareholds for regular background income: the fishing and whaling ships came through winter quite well, and the Iron Bank is a byword for safe investment.  
  
On the personal business front, paperclips are go. In between other work, a productive meeting with the guild's head of stores saw quantity, delivery time and payment schedule determined close to the satisfaction of all involved, and set down in legally binding ink. Later that day, as time permitted, I managed to do the same with the coppersmith that supplied me previously. Finally, since I had a job already and no desire to go mad with the fiddly monotony of bending wire, I managed to sort out some casual labour. One of cook's nephews as it happens, and it's turned into a good arrangement all round. Since he's twelve (or something like that) he can be thankful for whatever he gets wage wise, and since he's stuck inside doing it, she can be sure he's not running with gangs and suchlike. He'll be thankful when he's older I'm sure. At this point the profit margin isn't great to be honest, but it exists at all so I can't rightly complain.


	7. Chapter 7

I watched the last Targaryens set foot in the city. It wasn't deliberate.

A ship had arrived from Gulltown that morning, hired under one of the new contracts that Magister Mararis had negotiated with the House Grafton, and the captain had the hilarious idea that he'd round up the weight of his cargo to, in all likelihood, cover up some smuggling on the side. You can imagine the trouble it would have caused my employer (read 'me') down the line if it hadn't been noticed as quickly as it was. rectifying the paperwork means getting the captain's mark on the new docket. Oh how I'll laugh about it some day, just not any day soon. The harbourmaster: absent, the longshoremen: singularly unhelpful, the ship's crew... oh you've made an enemy in me lads, don't think you haven't.

Long story short, eventually tracked him down and it only took the whole damned morning. And yes, he's in one of those bars; bad ale, bad clientele, bad goings on out of sight in general. Minor detour once I recognised the neighborhood to pick up essentials before preceding (water dancer - one of, pay on completion of service), then the drama. You know what it's like when you walk into a bar and everything goes quiet? Like that, but with visible weapons. He's easy to spot (there's a reason sailors have to wear striped shirts) and I give him every last opportunity to clear things up and no hard feelings. We reach an impasse in our debate, which had been developing away from polite discourse as it progressed. He draws a knife, the water dancer draws a sword. The bartender decides he doesn't need this type of hassle and raises a crossbow. It was all rather awkward. I did get the captain's mark in the end, because no one there wanted the watch involved and I was far to well dressed to not be on the pay of someone rich enough to cause grief if crossed.

Afterwards, when I was out of the customs house and paying the dancer for their services, I happened to look over his shoulder and right there was a mess of platinum hair atop a small boy being herded by a knight and followed by a gaggle of servants, one of who was carrying a bundle of skirling newborn. I don't believe there's cause for concern or action as yet, plenty of people crossed their path and went of to lead happy and fulfilling lives afterwards.

Besides which, I'd ran into a small issue with my nascent stationary empire through events entirely of other people's making, and had to focus my limited personal time on it instead. The Iron Bank decided that the paperclip would be a useful tool in its day to day activities and enquired with the Guild as to a greater than sample scale purchase. In a manner that surprised me they have also caught on among my peers, and between those two lines of demand I'd hit a bottleneck in production (Cook's nephew is 'steady' in his workrate). I didn't have the resources at hand to set up a more professional operation, and it wasn't bringing in enough to justify taking out a legitimately sourced loan, putting me in a slight pickle. After due consideration a solution was devised however, and instead of making them myself I've agreed a license of manufacture with the Guild, who can use it as a productive means of punishment on apprentices to cut costs.

I'm getting less per unit now than before, but on the other hand I have more time to worry about my employer's long term solvency. Also, worth mentioning at this juncture, Magister Mararis is not currently aware of my sideline and it is somewhat improper of me to be moonlighting (it implies he's stingy with wages). Depending on how things go over the quarter though, that might not be an issue.

While he managed to avoid too much bad debt in his dealings with the Westerosi, he also missed out on getting back into the game properly after they finished laying waste to themselves. Those that extended credit to the rebels back at the start have made their money back now and are in the position to make use of the diplomatic capital they built up doing so to secure new deals and keep out competitors. It was a long shot speculation as far as anyone here was concerned, and generally seen as a lucky gamble more than a smart move, but one that's paid off in the end either way. In response to the current market difficulties, he's broken out into a case of risk taking disguised as decisiveness. I don't know....there aren't even any lead water pipes to blame it on.

This at any rate is what leads me to chasing down errant captains and such, which I should point out is not really in the job description. The point of hiring someone like me is, in principle, to - A) keep the filing and accounts straight, and B) have things written in a beautiful manner. All of the extra bits and pieces that we do end up doing should still flow from those things. So, making enough trips the Iron Bank's business desk that I'm on casual terms with the clerks is par for the course, chasing down the clerically irregular is somewhat off-piste. There are people that you hire for that sort of thing.

So, as it will be grasped, I'm having a very busy time of it lately by any measure. I didn't expect much leisure time in this life, but some would be nice. Nesera informs me that she also thinks it's a pity I don't have time to do other things, which sounds like a warning to be taken seriously.

  
  
  


 

 


	8. Chapter 8

I can't believe I'm saying this, but thank the Gods winter has arrived. I've spent the last five months aging five years as the Mararis family fortune took on the characteristics of a patient that was, if not terminal, in worrying decline. Recently I was even dispatched by the lady of the house to open a new bank account in her name and deposit several pieces of family jewelry, which cannot be a good sign. Not to mention a professional grey area. Nesera also says that there have been words between Madam and her husband (we're still on good terms, but the passion hasn't survived).  
  
It's been like some sort of mania has overtaken him of late, blinded him to the 'risk' aspect of these high risk/high return investments that he keeps pouring money into. And fair play, some of them have paid off with spectacular results, but not enough to offset the ones that haven't. And that's not even touching on what I'm quite sure were outright scams which were mostly stopped in their tracks. Mostly. I had to, on one occasion, perform an ink chromatography test (out of my own pocket) to prove a map was not genuinely Valyrian.  
  
He's getting fewer letters these days from the Old Crowd as well. I wouldn't say bridges that have been burned, just left to fall too far into disrepair. Sending the equivalent of out-of-office/we-value-your-call letters to several of them on a semi-regular basis has let me keep lines of communication open so far, but at this point it's getting to be wasted initiative. I'd joke about finding someone in the field of post-mortem communication so I could ask Daranio for advice, but then I remember that on Planetos you can actually get that if you pay enough blood and tears.  
  
It's a scary place when you stop and think about it. Perhaps the reason I try not to.  
  
Winter though. That put paid to a great deal of non-essential business, and the seasonal kind I can run through quite briskly now I'm up to speed with the workings of it. Time to start seriously considering my options for the future, and make plans for when summer arrives.  
  
Paper clips were never going to be my ticket to independent wealth, but they were a start and established a degree of credibility in the necessary circles. The real money was going to lie in something that couldn't be easily copied by just any idiot, had a good level of value-added, and a customer base that wouldn't need much convincing. Not too big an ask, I'm sure. Luckily I arrived here with a master's degree in fine art, and scribes are the lifeblood the Free Cities. If I can offer them something that makes life easier and produces a consistently better result...Well, there's potential there.  
  
The nib of a dip pen, unlike the paperclip, requires a good level of technical skill and precision to produce, especially if you're going in for all the variable options in shape and type (I will be). And it does have to be steel if you want it to out-compete reed pens or feather quills, so the one unavoidable hold up will be finding someone with the expertise to make them. Almost certainly I'm going to need to hire a Qohori smith to start with, but that won't be right away.  
  
Now I can describe a high quality calligraphy nib in my sleep, so producing a few parchment models for demonstration purposes just needed a razor blade and steady hand, both of which were readily available. These were for the first of two meetings I'd need to have. This one was with a pair of guild masters, since if I couldn't convince people who had spent their lives hand cutting quills of the benefit of my idea, then the plan was shot entirely. If they went for it, I'd look for them to underwrite having a silversmith make a version to take to the meeting that would follow (based on the agreement that the Guild would get a cut for acting as distributors).  
  
They were open to the concept (eventually), but if I didn't have prior success in this area behind me they might not have been. Minor modification to the plan: my cut of the paper clip money as collateral for their small loan. Fine, I can live with that. A silversmith was found, and duly managed to produce a pair of silver nibs after a sufficiently detailed set of specifications were set out. At the same time I'm almost certain that there was a fundamental misunderstanding in our conversation, and a new form or jewelry may have been invented. More pertinently, I went on to (carefully) write a page of text as proof of concept under the watchful eyes of my betters. They looked upon it, and it was good.  
  
The previously mentioned 'meeting to follow' was because if I wanted to kickstart this enterprise into operation, I was going to need a not insignificant loan. Off to the Iron Bank then, business plan and Guild endorsement in hand. They only made me wait half an hour. To make the request for an appointment.  
  
The Iron Bank, for all that it funds Kings and services Magisters of significant status, is also happy to help a captain replace the sails of his cog or a weaver buy a new loom. When you get down to the bottom line, what matters is that you can pay back the amount agreed in the manner agreed, not how much you want. It goes without saying that your financial history will be forensically examined, who you are involved with business-wise double checked, and you yourself interrogated in a manner not out of place in a national security investigation. I sometimes wonder how the financial institutions from my old life would cope with having the Iron Bank dropped into their midst... At any rate, I got at least as far as a face to face meeting on the strength of their background checks, my prior success, and he Guild's good word. The hard bit of course starts once you're sitting on that hard wooden bench.  
  
I like to think I held up well under their scrutiny, all things considered. They sat unmoved, poker faced and silent, through my presentation. Asked their questions with blandly and acknowledged answers with a lack of inflection that still implied the worst. A demonstration was requested alongside the sample provided. A bank clerk was then brought in so I could give him an overview and demonstration of how it worked, so he could then write out a piece himself. Having been asked to wait in the antechamber while they questioned the clerk and deliberated in private, I did think to myself, 'well, I'm sure it could have gone worse'.  
  
Final decision when I was recalled: the Iron Bank was agnostic on the short-term returns to be had, but agreed on the dip pen's long term dominance over the quill. Signatures were signed, money changed hands. They did not however believe that a Qohori trained smith (and thus a pause until summer came back, plus additional costs) would be required, and invited me to visit the Fraternal Society of Bladesmiths at my convenience.


	9. Chapter 9

A wise man once said: When a business goes down, it's not how many shares you own, it's how many assets you can strip before the repossession order is enacted.  
  
This bankruptcy did not drop out of the blue and I'm quite certain no one other than the (ex)Magister himself was surprised when the Iron Bank sent a strongly worded letter regarding the state of his finances (re: negative values). Madam, accompanied by the children, nanny and Nesera, has removed herself to a spare set of apartments in her family's townhouse while she recovered from the ordeal of discovering that her husband is poor. Everyone else in the household legged it with the silverware once word got out. I started making an inventory of the house's contents, just for convenience later on. There wasn't any reason for me to run about the place, my wages for the next month had already been paid in advance the week before. As the person handling the money I had enough warning to make appropriate arrangements.  
  
I'd feel more sorry for his plight if I wasn't just so done with him. I tried to help, but there is only so much I could do, and our working relationship had started to suffer from the number of times I was raising a query about his choices. He didn't have a great deal to do in real terms once the Iron Bank's representative arrived, so I left them with watered wine while 'options going forward' were discussed. Their clerk and I retired to my office with small ale to make sure everyone's bookkeeping was on the same page, and talk shop (we sit on opposite sides of the iron gall/lampblack schism).  
  
All of which, in the end, led to me being unemployed.  
  
Well ok, I'm technically self employed, what with the dip pen project and all, but until that starts turning a profit it amounts to the same thing. The bladesmiths are doing quite well actually, they've got a design that works and its mostly sorting out a process to scale up for bulk production that's taking time at the moment. Thankfully this is Essos, where skilled craftsmen understand that they can actually work with each other on a project without losing face (we had to consult with armarours on a small issue, them being the only group with experience working with sheet metal).  
  
Now, as a fully paid up and accredited member of the Guild (who recognised that my current state of employment is the fault of others), I was provided with a stipend sufficient to keep body and soul together while they found me a new position. Which they did. Quite quickly in fact, but winter had been more of a speedbump than a stop sign to trade this time round (it only lasted about nine months, which barely qualifies the title 'winter').  
  
So there I went, light of foot and innocent to what may lie ahead, address memorised and case in hand. Not a bad bit of town, no sign of subsidence and not that far from where I'd been before as it turned out. I'd like to say that something twigged as not right, that I felt a chill run down my spine or some such as I arrived. But I'd be lying. Truth be told, the only thing that raised concerns was that it was owned by a Westerosi and there was probably going to be an awkward conversation about the difference between a servant and an employee. But hey, it was a job, and beggars can't be choosers.  
  
It was a nice place, bit more extravagant with the exterior decor than the Old Money Quarter, but a lot of the new blood has been into that kind of raffish edge recently. The doorman (I'm embarrassed on their behalf...) directed me to follow him through to the Master's study at the back, so I got a good look at the place en route. Bit of a mixed bag; plenty of money spent, just not very well. Bigger than it looked from the street, they even had an orangery.  
  
Glancing across it I didn't stare, gasp, trip, or make an improper utterance. All of which would have been quite understandable given the platinum haired boy reaching up for a lemon that a platinum haired toddler was waving their hands at. I don't recall the rest of the short walk until a voice barked for us to enter, and I was introduced to 'Ser' Willem Darry. Yes, and suddenly the name I was given at the guild-house, 'Mstr Darry', is ringing a bell. And to think it was barely two years ago I was taking the long way home to avoid crossing their paths at the harbour. Doesn't Lady Luck just love her little jests?  
  
Yeah. So it only took a half hour talking with him to work out why the servants cut and run without a backward glance when he died (yes, I do appreciate that's rich after what happened with my previous employer), and why he had a pressing need for a secretary between him and the rest of the world. Don't know what the maesters are teaching the nobility over there, but it's not civility, I tell you that. Professional reputation alone prevents me dropping this job the way it deserves to be.  
  
And another thing. Who let him free to roam without someone that knew how to handle money. At all. There is a chest that is used for day to day finances (not even a disguised one at that) and they have the rest under a paving stone. The ledgers? What are these strange things you speak of?  
  
I don't want to say that everything that went wrong after this point in the books' story can be laid at the feet of Ser Darry's inability to handle a household budget. But I'd be remiss if I didn't put it forward as a strong possibility. Between the money I know about, the money I haven't come across yet, and, oh yes, Queen Rhaenys' royal jewelry, there is no good reason for them to not be living a comfortable (if not extravagant) life until at least the Grand March of the Others.


	10. Chapter 10

To give him his due, I'm picking up the notion that (deep down) Ser Darry does understand that he's not well suited for running a household. He was certainly quick enough to hand everything in that area over to my jurisdiction (and don't bother him with details just get it done). I can work with that. It probably helps that I'm taking slight advantage of prior social conditioning (thank you Citadel) through the strategic use of a silver(ish) neck chain.  
  
First things first: a third of the staff are out the door with a week's wages and a letter of referral. I'd have gone further, but that would have probably been stepping on the toes of someone's right to be ran after for every little thing. It can be worked on later at any rate. And yes, it was an entirely selective dismissal of those I thought less than committed to their work, or overly committed to lining their pockets. Slight reshuffle of the remainder and a couple of new hires finished off the purge.  
  
I do this not only out of good financial sense, but consideration of the household's social standing too. Big staff just isn't done among the social elite, and for all that they are Westerosi barbarians that don't know any better, they are also Westerosi barbarians and so will need to try harder than everyone else if they want to make a go of things here. And, full disclosure, I don't want to be tarred with that brush. I have a future ahead of me, and no desire in ten years time to have conversations open with, 'oh yes, you worked for the people with the embarrassing disregard for social mores didn't you?'  
  
We also now have a bank account! Oh, the joys of modern life. I'll tell you now, the process of transferring the cash and jewelry to the security of the Iron Bank's vaults was an experience. I nearly had to take a crowbar to Viserys to get the Queen's crown off him, and he can hate all he wants but there was no way it was staying somewhere with lesser walls than feet thick bedrock. At least Ser Darry understood my reasoning, if not the background theory of modern banking. Honestly, I've never seen so much liquid wealth move in one go before. I've never been so concerned about moving money before. But it's done now thank the gods (and the half dozen water dancers escorting us). Staff, contractors and the like can now be paid without digging up a chest of money. I still break out into a cold sweat thinking about it (and if I learned nothing else since landing here it's that you never pay cash in hand if you want your letter of credit taken seriously afterwards).  
  
Now, technically, the household has no income (and so is destined for the red eventually), but it does have money that won't be touched for years, and that can be put to work doing something useful. For this investment folio, the watchwords will be 'reliable' and 'steady'. Half of the entire fortune goes into Iron Bank shares, and a further ten percent each into shares of the principal banks of Volantis and Qarth (funds for in the event of disaster, and the need to drop everything and run).  
  
This, of course, brings us round to the fact that there is no avoiding the centre of gravity that the household orbits, The Children. My only mandated requirement for interacting with them is, currently, teaching Viserys to read and write with style in a selection of languages. But in reality there's no avoiding them on even an hour-to-hour basis.  
  
Of the 'Young Dragon' himself (a nickname that will stop if I have anything to do about it), I will say he is everything you'd expect of spoiled royalty removed from their comfort zone. But he's also exactly what you'd expect of a small boy that's been through a traumatic separation from his parents, home, and prior worldview. Nothing a good child psychologist and many years of therapy couldn't put right, but all he has is a knight with their own mental health issues, and a fine arts graduate from another universe. It would really help matters if Ser Darry wasn't convinced that Viserys actually was going to be King of the Seven Kingdoms one day, and started guiding him down a different path. But then again he was one of the most dedicated Loyalists there was, so no chance of that happening. I mean, it's not my job to save him and the hand fate dealt him, but you can't have a child in that state dropped into your lap and not be expected to do something.  
  
Daenerys at least is too young to be anything other than a toddler going through an obsession with yellow phase. I can only deal with averting one person's fate at a time.  
  
On a personal front, the test batch of dip pens made with the new method (a given value of production line) are a success. Not the fastest process in the world, but all involved know that's just a matter of time getting things smoothed out, so no worries in that regard. Pre-orders will be completed in as even handedly a manner as is politically expedient, and a small batch of gold ones are going to a select few individuals. The Sealord's office is looking like a good long term customer, which is unexpected but good in a 'oh damn I didn't plan for this kind of demand' sort of way. The purple dye that makes the sails of Braavosi ships so distinct is also used in official documents, and some property of it seems to accelerate the deterioration of the fine edges on steel nibs.


	11. Chapter 11

So. It seems that I've just set the new textbook definition of 'awkward encounter'.  
  
There I am, walking to the Iron Bank with a couple of my fellows after a touch of private guild business, just minding our own business, when we have to take a detour round where a body is being fished out of the canal (Magisterial politics...What can you do?). Nikos was regaling us, again, with the increasingly tiresome ' _no Ma'am, not that type of gentleman's companion_ ' story from when he was in Myr with his employer's son, when as we were skirting a bunch of beggars there comes a surprised shout and one of them staggering up, calling my name.  
  
It's my old employer, Nakarro Mararis.   
  
It does me take a moment to recognise him (the street hasn't been kind) and Jacab gives a hushed gasp of recognition not much later. And well...What now? I mean it's not like there's really any suitable conversational gambits for a situation like this. It's not my finest moment, but put on the spot like that and with no time to engage my brain, I stuck a silver piece in his hands, turned us around and, in a nutshell, legged it with a firm grip on their arms. We all agreed it was one of those things that didn't need talked about further.  
  
Perhaps I should have taken it as a sign, because the day proceeded to roll downhill as it progressed.  
  
Ser Darry has finally found a Septon that he thought was sufficiently A) loyal to the Targaryen cause, and B) trustworthy to bring into the household for the spiritual education and well-being of his charges. It might have been useful if he'd also checked off C) not a complete lunatic. I don't know if Rasputin's soul might have transmigrated to Planetos after his death, but it would explain things. I'm given to understand that he spent the last seven years wandering the hills of Andelos before being drawn here by the will of the Seven, where he would aid the True King in regaining his throne and bringing the people back to the proper way of the Gods.  
  
He might also trip during the night and smoother himself with a pillow, but that's another matter. Daenerys doesn't like him, so Viserys doesn't like him either on principle, making for a delightful atmosphere as you can imagine. At least the he isn't old enough to get his hands on anything too sharp without supervision. I'm an unclean heathen of course but also peripheral in the greater scheme of things, just like the rest of the staff. Which is an interesting statement to make when at least three of the religions represented on the Isle of Gods find room for human sacrifice under the right circumstances, and I'd put good money on him not being connected to, or backed by, the Sept-Beyond-the-Sea.  
  
Topping off the day, we will be entertaining a guest in a fortnight or so: Prince Oberyn Martell himself. Which if I remember correctly is going to end with a clandestine arranged marriage between Vicerys and Prince Doran's daughter. There's no way that it could go wrong of course, perish the very thought that the convoluted plots and schemes that are so in fashion right now might come back to bite everyone. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if the reason measters keep their monopoly on ravens was just so they can bin the worst ideas for conspiracies that the Westerosi Highborn send each other.  
  
As for the man himself, I've no idea. But stories proceed him and if even half are almost true then it's going to be an experience having him stay. Luckily I'm not part of high society, so can keep a good professional distance from proceedings and deal with the fallout rather than be part of the meltdown.  
  
For the moment though I'm drowning things out with a backlog of paperwork. Ser Darry had the type of mindset that understood in theory about keeping records, but not past the most literal and direct interpretation, putting me in the same position as a tax accountant that's just had a bin bag of receipts dumped on his desk. Technically the finances would survive without me dealing with the mess, and I could live without the flashbacks to Old Daranio's file-by-memorising-the-mess approach, but the things we do out of professionalism. I also need to see how much, and by who, they've been robbed blind so they can be blacklisted.  
  
On a related subject, something odd seems to have been going on, money wise, when they first arrived. Exhibit A) I can lay my hands on the deeds for the townhouse, but not the purchase note. Now, this is interesting because that document is one that would have been produced by the Iron Bank, and while the deeds are the important civil document, the note is the ultimate proof of whose money was used to buy it. In the event of a dispute, documentation issued by the bank will trump most everything else.  
  
Through the long and laborious application of bureaucracy I'll be able to replace it, but the fact that Darry did it with hard cash is going to add another few steps to the process. Not least getting him to the bank for the several hours it's going to take for things to be looked up, cross checked, and verified. That can wait till our visitor has been and gone though, with luck a day of peaceful sitting around will be welcome afterwords.  
  
In the shrinking amount of free time I find myself with, the Crossed Quills beckons. I’ve received, of late, so much sympathy for getting 'the Knight' that my regular companions had to force grins and mirth to stop from falling into despair at my plight. It was so bad that one of them even woke up the next morning with a rude word on their forehead, and we all felt equally bad for him too.  
  
More professionally, dip pens are starting to roll off production at a respectable rate, and are going down nicely once the small learning curve is overcome. Pre-orders are still getting everything as yet, but the feedback is translating into kudos from above, and I'm informed that a small opening among the offices of the guild might be available after the new year.


	12. Chapter 12

Well, it took a bit of luck, but over the whole week he was there I managed to only cross paths with Prince Oberyn once. Excluding the times when we literally crossed paths, which was quite regularly, what with it being a townhouse, not a castle.  
  
As suspected there was a marriage contract in the offing, pretty standard wording as these things go, nothing lurking in the clauses, or invisible ink waiting to creep up on anyone. If the whole endeavour wasn't being kept as quiet as a church mouse, I could have brought Guild level scrutiny to bear on it, but discretion was the watchword. That the Sealord was willing to put his name to it as witness is probably as good a guarantee as any you'll get anyway, nobody gets to that rank without a good education in skulduggery and related subjects.  
  
The Sealord's Palace, I should add, is an outstanding bit of architecture, easily the equal to anything I remember from Before. You really have to have been there to appreciate how much skill is at work displaying so much raw wealth while making it look like it was the last thing on you mind; a Junior Secretary I noticed had the Braavosi coat of arms embroidered on their undercoat with sea silk!  
  
I'll admit to being surprised at being let in on the Plan™ at all, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't at least a bit worried that either the Prince or Ser Darry were seeing the words 'loose end' flashing over me. At any rate, I didn't eat anything made in the house until after out guest had left.  
  
To be fair, that's quite an unworthy comment. The Prince was, as far as I could tell, the model of civility and spoke to the staff in a manner any native Braavosi employer might. He does have the advantage of spending a good amount of time on this side of the Narrow Sea, proving the benefits of travel on minds that might not be raised with the full advantage of an enlightened society (I say 'enlightened'. No heads on spikes at least, and a more complex understanding of the employer/contractor relationship. I'm not saying my position on this might not have been different if I'd woken up in the body of a young Mace Tyrell, for example. But what were the chances of that?).  
  
One area of the scheme that is a touch fuzzy from my perspective, is that there doesn't actually seem to be one. There is just an arranged marriage, with very little in the way of frills. I can only assume that Prince Doran has something in mind, he's taking a major risk putting this down on parchment and if this leaked then I wouldn't want to be in his shoes, I tell you that. Don't get me wrong, I'm fully capable of missing a clandestine communications pipeline operating under my nose, but I don't think it's too far out to suggest that Ser Darry might not be the type to involve if you were setting one up. More to the point I don't see how anything could get to him with my noticing it, if only for his having a practically non-existent correspondence to hide it among.  
  
On the plus side, the Prince was quite interested, well.. somewhat curious, in these odd quills everyone was using in the Palace. I wasn't approaching anywhere near raising my head over that parapet, gods no, but you know, it's a nice feeling of validation. Once they start to take off over the water, only a matter of time before the Maesters realize the benefits, I'll also put out a hit on the first one of them that claims the idea came from the Citadel. Nothing personal (actually it's very personal, and the same applies to paper clips), but I didn't uplift my profession to see the credit go elsewhere. _Autem scribæ virtute._  
  
Viserys seems to be having a slight worldview adjustment moment from the visit, and not a bad one I think. His father does appear to have ingrained a certain opinion regarding the Dornish, one at odds I believe with his mother's, and the Prince's stay has forced a slight confrontation over the discrepancy. Perhaps I'm over analysing, he's been reading a history of the last Dornish War, and you can hear the cogs turning. Daenerys seemed to like him, but he did give her a silver bracelet with lots of small choking hazards dangling from it, so it might just be proxy affection.  
  
Septon Rasputin is still alive, and still off his head. I don't believe I'm the only one in the household that felt that if the Red Viper was going to infringe on the house's hospitality he could at least take five minutes to live up to the worst of his reputation and leave a questionable death behind when he departed. Enough on that subject though.  
  
With my fortunes on the rise, vis-a-vis future stationary empire, I've been enjoying the experience of better lined pockets in a place I've waited some time to visit. There is what can only be described as a turkish bath being run by a group of Summer Isle expats, one I discovered entirely by chance ages ago when they were throwing a customer into the canal over some disagreement. I haven't felt so clean in years. And the massage... They'd get pulled up in front of a judge for doing that anywhere else. I can't honestly imagine what they must charge in winter, but the ability to afford it is probably one of the hallmarks of reaching so-wealthy-it-shouldn't-be-allowed status.  
  
Oddly enough, the question on people's lips at the bar was about any women that might have been there, which, as I said to them, is a) terribly stereotypical, and b) entirely between me and the lady in question.


	13. Chapter 13

I’m rather pleased to announce, the dip pen is now the officially sanctioned writing implement of the Guild of Scribes, Notaries and Related Trades. I have had to reinvest almost every penny to date in making it happen, but once the Iron Bank and the Sealord’s Palace were fully on board it was only a matter of time and paying off the right widows and orphans funds. The first classes of new apprentices are receiving their formative training with them instead of quills, or (gods help us all) reed pens. A good few of the older generation can’t be doing with this modern nonsense, however much it’s an objective improvement, but most of them are retired or just looking for reasons to complain about the youth of today; we had to go catch our own octopus when we needed ink, not like this bottled stuff you lot use. Rumour has it that the House of Black and White has even pulled off a hit with one, which is patently false since no one would know about it, but you can’t buy advertising like that, so no complaints here.  
  
There is going to be a bit of difficulty when it comes to the other Free Cities unfortunately, intellectual copyright is a rather loose concept and there are enough skilled metalworkers about (looking at you Qohor) that reverse engineering wouldn’t take an undue length of time. If there were other guilds out there then it might be a manageable concern, but nine out of ten people elsewhere is Essos doing what we do are slaves. On the other hand, without guilds there is no one to push for any innovation in the industry so maybe we’ll (that is to say, I’ll) not have too organised an infringement. The idea of specially made commemorative, or custom, pens has been fielded, which has potential.  
  
On the crest of this wave of success, I am now an official office holder among my brethren. Somewhat ironically, I'm the Holder of the Knife, that is to say the one used to cut a quill, which makes me responsible for making sure all the other officeholders have access to writing implements. It’s also, technically, a non-paying office, though this is worth a fuller explanation.   
  
There is not a small list of things a scribe needs to go about their job, and it has come to be understood that if you are not one of the people contracted to supply the guild’s officeholders, you are not getting business from any of it’s scribes. I’ve managed to circumvent that issue up to date through the ‘’feather loophole’, where it was understood that feathers grow wild and free, and no one was going to make a living off selling them (not until the eider duck is invented anyway). Now, obviously, this meant there was a lot of livelihoods at risk among the suppliers of ink, parchment and the like if they were left out, so a carefully arranged bidding process emerged that ensured that they all won some portion of the contracts on offer. And because the Holder of the Knife would be so busy going over the bids that he would be unable to carry out the traditional duties of a scribe, the bidders arranged to provide support to him at this time. To avoid any question of impropriety or scurrilous rumour regarding these donations, if there was any excess it would be gifted to the fund that covered those guild members that found themselves unemployed.   
  
This is expressly not bid rigging, a kickback scheme, or institutionally endorsed bribery. It expressly is a one time only thing, just in case anyone gets ideas about extortion or unjust competition (which would spoil the whole deal for everyone).  
  
Beyond this small financial matter, I now have something that could be the respect and admiration of my peers, a named place at the table on high days and holidays, and access to the supply cupboard without having to justify myself to the keyholder. For official guild ceremonies and related pageantry I’m situated sixth from the front, prepare the ink for documents, and have to pay for the upkeep of the velvet pillow that the ceremonial pen is carried on. None of this excuses me from my day job.  
  
And that day job is throwing up an interesting conundrum, not a good interesting either, more a ‘may you live in interesting times’ kind of thing. With Prince Oberyn out of the way, I got the ball rolling on replacing some of Ser Darry’s missing paperwork (re: proving ownership of the house). This involved the start of a long and bureaucratic, but ultimately straightforward, process of getting the iron Bank to confirm one piece of paperwork through cross referencing others. It should not have involved them asking me to confirm the validity of the paperwork I held. It is, to put the situation in context, like sending in your tax returns and having the Inland Revenue asking if you can prove that you’re a legal citizen.  
  
Now, under normal circumstances where this sort of thing occurs (rare but it happens), I’d track down the scribe that preceded me, and so on and so forth, till I had signed affidavits from everyone connected to the document vouching for it. Except I am the only scribe that has worked for Ser Darry. Ever. His is the only seal or signature I can find on anything, and he confirms that he did it himself with the help of an agent he hired.   
  
I know this can’t be the case however, because there are no third party brokers for property in this city. Braavos covers 120% of the solid ground available, the land this town house is built on is worth more than the building and its contents combined. If anyone is parting with their real estate it is either going to the Iron Bank after they defaulted on their debts, at which point it would be immediately sold on, or (on very rare occasions) directly to the next owner. No unnecessary middlemen are needed or desired when all involved will have access to their own personal secretaries and scribes.  
  
I really don’t need this kind of hassle in my life.


	14. Chapter 14

Until now I haven’t really appreciated how much living in the world of ice and fire has changed me from who I was when I arrived. I realise it has been a gradual process, no sudden leaps or disjunctions in paradigm, but still, you’d imagine some appreciation before getting to the stage where you notice the gulf between the two points.

I was standing in one of the disused rooms in the Sealord’s Palace, deliberately disused just because he can afford it, where a small concludium was being enacted to verify the actual chain of ownership that went with the House of the Red Door. Myself, Syrapho (Under-Secretary for Palace Archives), and Salleo (Iron Bank auditor extraordinary) had plotted out in coloured chalk diagrams and piles of slate notation the movements, transactions and exchanges involved, junior flunkies dispatched as needed to confirm details from various records. It’s all going smoothly, we’ve hit our stride and the chalk dust is flying as we cross-reference and consolidate the mad spider’s web into orderly lines. There is not a small amount of professional satisfaction in the air (mixed with the chalk dust), and it looks like we’ll have this sorted for end of day.

And then I’m suddenly aware, starkly, of what is going on and how I’m relating to it. I’m enjoying this. The structure, order, systematic processes involved. One of the lackeys smudged a line with his shoe and by the gods I actually tutted at him. When did this happen? It’s like arriving here all over again from a different direction. This was never anything like I envisioned my life, regardless of which world I was in. I’ve become a bureaucrat with a small measure of power and I like it.

I didn’t fall apart over it or anything, but it certainly bears further thought in private.

At any rate, our efforts gleaned us the moment where the paperwork got into a snarl. The account of the previous owner was still open in the Iron Bank, while the civil records listed him as deceased. Depending on how things go, this could turn out well or bad for Ser Darry. The fact that no one came to claim the account implies no relatives that could stake a claim to the building, so it might be just a matter of processing fees to cover the cost of working this all out, on the other hand if one does turn up then he’s looking at several years of backdated rent, and possible eviction. Despite how much it looks like the prior situation will come to pass, Braavos is very big on private property rights and will recognise some quite obscure degrees of relation. They do only have six months from the bank officially noting his death and posting it on the noticeboard to do it though, so fingers crossed.

With Ser Darry being Ser Darry, I’ve gone for the ’lies to children’ approach. It’s better for everyone involved if he just gets the bottom line and where to sign without the jargon. It also gives me more time for my existential crisis.


End file.
